Summer Days, Summer Nights
by Roby Carr
Summary: Virgil Hawkins and Richie Foley only wanted to have a normal summer - so did Jackie Kelly-Goss and Claire Roberts. But for superheroes and mutants, that doesn't happen. A third Bang happens and the teens team up to save Dakota. !Rest in Pieces sequel!
1. 1: School Is So Last Week!

"**Summer Days, Summer Nights**"  
By _Roby Carr  
_Part One: _School Is So Last Week!_

-----

"Jackie! I finally found the pair of red cargos that I wore to the homecoming game last September! And my Biology book is in here too!"

Jaclyn Edith Kelly-Goss only raised an eyebrow and leaned back against Andrew Robb's locker as she peered over at her best friend. Less than a foot away, at the next locker over, Claire Lillian Roberts was digging through her own locker, rambling about every old item she found in there. Under most circumstances, Jackie would have made an extremely sarcastic comment about 'sweet nostalgia' and would have headed to the cafeteria to get a bottle of Gatorade and a bag of Cheetos from the vending machines, but it was hard to be cynical or hungry when everyone was so loud and happy.

It was that last day of the school year at Glen Ellyn Public High School in Glen Ellyn, Illinois and even Jackie would admit she was having fun. The hall around them was filled with sophomores cleaning out lockers, reliving the good times and hugging goodbyes, though they would more often than not be seeing each other at parties within the next week. Due to the last day of school, Jackie suspected fully that most of them were also heading out to party that night, one of the things she was - in an unusual turn of events - partaking in.

"Ewww..." Claire cried, holding something as far away from her as possible and wrinkling her nose in disgust at it, "Jackie! Look it this! It's so gross!"

Glancing down, Jackie did, in all honesty, have to say that the... the _thing_ that Claire was holding was quite possibly the most disgusting thing she'd ever seen. It was a plastic Ziploc bag containing something that might have been food - a sandwich? - at one point in time. Something was scrawled on it in thick permanent marker, but Claire's cursive handwriting was, as always, illegible to Jackie when she was without her glasses.

"What is it?" she finally sputtered, staring at the thing with undisguised repulsion.

"I think it was from my health project last fall - you know, the one on the nutrition values of McDonald's food?" Claire guessed and began giggling, "You hungry?"

"What is that, a mutated Big Mac or something?" a masculine voice asked and Jackie squinted her eyes. When she looked closely, she finally made out the words 'BIG MAC' and she could form the slight outline of an extremely deformed fast food item underneath a thick layer of white fuzz.

"I thought I took it all out of here the afternoon after I presented my project," Claire explained in a slightly apologetic tone, looking sort of guilty. Looking up though, her expression became confused and she cocked her head to the side, dropping the Ziploc bag back into her locker carelessly. "Vince-" she stammered, flushing and standing quickly. Jackie rolled her eyes at the fuss she made of straightening her skirt.

Vince grinned at them, his hands were tucked into his pockets as casually as was possible. He was a senior, possibly one of the hottest guys that were graduating from Glen Ellyn High that year in the well-known opinion of most of the school's female population. Jackie thought he was rather bland looking in comparison to a certain senior with dreadlocks, but Claire was in agreement with the rest of the girls.

"I thought that you were supposed to be at that rehearsal for graduation," Claire said and Jackie wanted to laugh. Her best friend was a talented girl - Speech, Lacrosse, Soccer, the viola - but flirting was one thing she could not do.

"Yeah. I am. Me and Ben snuck out." Claire flushed even deeper.

"But where is-"

"Mister Vincenzo!" a voice boomed and Vince smirked, winking at Claire.

"Right on time, as usual." He turned away from the girls and shouted back, "Mister Benecio!"

As if on cue, the sea of excited sophomores parted and even Jackie had the decency to flush a flattering shade of bright red at the appearance of yet another of Glen Ellyn High's most worshiped senior males. Jackie had heard plenty from Claire about the clean-cut Vince with his Italian-American features and his spiked black hair - but Ben was far better looking in Jackie's eyes. He was taller than Vince and had coarse cut dark brown hair, his skin a few shades darker naturally. What Jackie knew of the two senior boys mostly came from Claire - mainly of the different things they had said while flirting with her when she would occasionally be correcting papers for her English teacher and they would be waiting for the previously mentioned teacher who was also their Speech coach.

"It must be my lucky day," Ben remarked, joining Vince near the two girls and leaning up against the locker to Claire's right, "I come looking for Mister Vincenzo and I find him chatting with the beautiful Miss Clarice and her ravishing acquaintance, Miss Jacqueline." Jackie was flushing so hotly that she quickly assumed Claire's previous position at the locker, piling trash in the brown paper bag at her side and refusing to look up until the boys and Claire had finished their goodbyes and she felt Claire crouch down beside her signaling they'd left.

"I think he likes you," her friend whispered and giggled as Jackie rolled her eyes, "Ben, I mean. Not Vince, you know, 'cause of his girlfriend."

"Ben likes anything that waltzes past on a miniskirt," Jackie replied, tossing a few broken pencils atop the pile of old math quizzes and other papers while she attempted to figure out a way around having to touch the Ziploc bag containing the Big Mac.

"You aren't wearing a miniskirt," Claire pointed out and watched as her friend finally just gave into picking up the corner of the bag with two fingers. The two girls stood up, Claire lifting the bag by its handles. "You know," she said, "I'm going to miss this locker."

Jackie sighed, "Why? You never remembered to locker combination. You had to keep asking the woman in the attendance office what it was." Claire just shrugged in response and deposited the brown paper bag into the trash can, following her best friend out of the school.

-----

At Dakota Union High School, the celebration on the last day of school had passed. Summer had officially started for its students, having let out two days earlier and for at least two of them, summer had already started getting boring. In the Hawkins household, where the air conditioning had blown out and the repairman couldn't come until the next day, Virgil Hawkins was actually bored.

And when you're a superhero, getting bored is an extremely hard feat to accomplish.

But even his best friend, the blonde super genius Richie Foley, couldn't come up with an idea of an activity that would take up the next hour and a half before Virgil's older sister, Sharon, returned with the car and they could head out to the always air-conditioned mall. Their marathon of the _Bloodsucker Teenage Zombie_ movies that had taken place the night before had left both boys drained of the energy it would take for Virgil and Richie's superhuman alter-egos, Static and Gear respectively, to go on yet another patrol. And besides, it would look slightly pathetic if people realized Static and Gear had nothing better to do that go on three patrols before one o' clock on a Saturday.

So instead, both teenagers sat slumped over at the kitchen table, waiting for some divine intervention to give them some inspiration as to what two teenage boys with superpowers were supposed to do.

It was Richie who finally spoke up. "One-on-one?"

Virgil's head, against the tabletop turned ever so slightly so that one eye could stare at his best friend. "Pops and Sharon already had enough trouble getting their cars over the blacktop. Didn't you see the marks, man?"

"Yeah... We go out there and we fry," Richie agreed, staring up at the clock. It felt like an hour had passed, but the clock only recorded five minutes. Maybe it was broken. "Aw, man... You just reminded me of something I heard lately. You'll never believe what people have been saying."

"Try me."

"They're letting Hotstreak out of jail."

At this, Virgil's head shot up and he turned full in his chair towards Richie, his eyes narrowed. "No way, man. Hotstreak can't be getting out already."

"The city only had him for petty arson and disturbing the peace. They were going to let him out in another two months anyway," Richie explained, looking just as frustrated with this. He ran a hand through his blonde hair, making a quick note that he needed to get a haircut now that summer was starting. He glanced up at the clock again. Another five minutes had passed. "Besides, it's always the same with bang babies. They lock 'em up in those cells right next to each other. Even if the city doesn't let those guys out, they break out all the time." A thoughtful look came over the super genius. "You know, man... I could probably sketch up some better equipment to keep bang babies in jail and then Gear could hand them over to the city..." The idea was tucked away in the back of his mind automatically.

"Great. You can think up schematics for stuff in seconds. You can build a laser out of a toaster. But you still can't figure out anything for us to do?" Virgil groaned, as he often did when his best friend began to stare off into the distance and talk about inventions.

"We could always watch _Bloodsucker Teenage Zombie IV: High School of the Apocalypse _again," Richie replied blandly, but the idea added a spark of interest in Virgil's eye.

"I'm thinking _Shopping Mall from Hell_."

"You've got a deal, man."

-----

"I can't believe you convinced me to do this, Claire," Jackie groaned, staring at the mirror in front of her, "Why did I ever think it would be alright to let you do this to me? Why?"

"Because you love me," her best friend answered casually, stepping back to take a look at the work she had done.

Jackie turned to face her friend, looking halfway between extremely annoyed and slightly pleased. Her dirty-blonde hair was short, just below her chin at it's longest point, having been cut that way the previous fall before school had started up again. It was tied back in two short pigtails, her bangs straight over a pair of dark brown eyes. Pale skin and no make-up were the usual on her elegant, defined features, much like her lack of jewelry. The grungy, black t-shirt she wore was from a Metallica concert, one of the many pieces of her late brother's wardrobe that had been passed down to her. It hung off her wiry form, but when Claire's thoughts lingered on it, she realized that Jackie wasn't thin because she didn't eat much - as had been the case last year while she was in mourning - but instead was thin because she'd been so active in sports lately. Jackie's shorts were actually from Claire's own closet and were camouflage girl's cargos fastened with a thick steel-studded belt. Underneath them, she wore black fishnets leading to a pair of high-tops that were, once again, borrowed from Claire.

"You look amazing," Claire finally told the other girl, smiling girlishly and flopping down by the bed. Jackie slumped back against the mirror and crossed her arms over her chest, glancing around the room before she glanced over at her friend, realizing she hadn't scrutinized the other girl's clothing choices. She was wearing a dark purple mini-skirt over her favorite pair of jeans, an extremely tacky fad that she'd fallen in love with. Her shirt was a simple white tank top, the straps made of lace. On her arms were Jackie's black and white striped arm warmers under several golden bangles. Around her neck was her favorite piece of jewelry, a Christmas present from her cousin that had been dubbed 'the Cleopatra necklace', and on her feet were orange, white and navy New Balance sneakers. Her hair, reddish-auburn curls that were coiled like tight springs, had been tied away from her naturally tan face in a low ponytail and, as she had taken to doing in the year, she was wearing smoky eye make-up and dark red lipstick. "What is it?" she asked suddenly, catching Jackie's eye, "Did I say something wrong, Jackie?"

Rolling her eyes, Jackie glanced at the mirror a second time before she decided that she was sick of caring what it was she looked like. It wasn't like she was hanging out with anyone tonight who hadn't seen her at her worst. She sat down next to Claire on the bed and her friend sat up, turning.

"So, who's coming again?" Claire asked, cocking her head to the side. Jackie heaved a sigh.

"I told you twice today, already. Why don't you tell me and I'll point it out when you screw up?"

Claire looked indignant as she replied, "I will not screw up! I completely remember. It's Angela, Jaime, Ryan, Leslie, Brenden, a couple of guys from the basketball team that Brenden said he would bring, Maria and Katie."

"And Michelle and Crystal," Jackie added, "but you got most of them, so you did good." Claire looked flattered by this compliment, so Jackie took it as a cue to change the subject while Claire was in a good mood. "Isn't your love slave supposed to be swinging by to pick us up?"

"I told you not to call him that. He's my boyfriend, not my love slave," Claire complained, "And yes, Brenden is coming soon."

"Let's get something to eat," Jackie said, standing and pulling her friend to her feet.

"We're eating at the bowling alley and then we're heading to Big 10 where we're going to eat again, Jackie. Why do you want to eat now?"

"Because I'm hun-" Jackie began to reply when the doorbell interrupted her in mid-sentence.

Claire grinned, looking extremely happy. "Ha! I win! No food for you!" she teased and Jackie rolled her eyes, letting Claire take her by the hand and pull her towards the door where they would meet their friends.

-----

Claire couldn't help but grin as she glanced at the scene around her. Their table - the really awesome one at the back that could fit, like, twenty people into one booth - was in total chaos. Both the salt and pepper shakers had been opened and overturned sometime ago by Leslie to keep Jaime from dumping anymore into her glass of Diet Coke. Not that it actually stopped his reign of terror. He simply got his hands on the shakers from the nearest table and dumped the entire of those into her drink. In fact, not one drink at the table was safe since the boys had started a game of Suicide Pop, dumping anything they could find into their glasses and daring each other to drink them. Ryan had almost thrown up on Maria, who was sitting next to him, when he had grabbed one Suicide Pop that a boy from the basketball team named Brady had mixed together. Claire had seen him dump ketchup, mustard, honey mustard, salt, pepper, Sprite, milk, and orange juice into half a glass of Coke before mixing it up with his spoon and challenging Ryan. Katie was yelling at another guy from the basketball team, Nick, for spilling one particularly nasty Suicide Pop all over her new suede skirt and her white top. Jamie was flirting with Angela because it seemed he was impressed by her ability to down one Suicide Pop after another without even gagging. Crystal and Michelle had left at least an hour ago, but not before Michelle had been drenched with a glass of water and Crystal had begun the Suicide Pop game.

Claire meanwhile was leaning forward, letting Brenden and Jackie argue above and on either side of her, while she dug into an extremely large bowl of chocolate-peanut butter ice cream.

This was what made her happy. Not the yelling and screaming and gagging and strange looking mixtures, but the whole idea that even though they were hating each other right now, they would undoubtedly be friends again in minutes. It just seemed to be how things worked.

"Claire! Tell that jerk that he's a jerk!" Jackie huffed, slamming back down next to her.

Claire glanced over at Brenden who was also back in his seat also, though he was glaring out the window furiously. "You know," she suggested carefully, "We should probably head out anyway. You and your family are leaving for Ecuador tomorrow, I think, and Jackie and I have to catch a plane pretty early-"

"Since when?" Brenden asked suddenly, turning to face her and not even noticing Jackie anymore, "You never said you were going somewhere."

Claire just shrugged innocently. It hadn't seemed like it was a big deal to her. She was going to have to stay with her aunt and uncle for two months anyway while her parents remodeled their house, so she had asked if Jackie could come. Her aunt and uncle said yes, Jackie said yes, plane tickets were bought, and suitcases were packed. It had seemed like such a simple process that Claire didn't even realize she hadn't mentioned it to anyone until now.

"I'm only going to spend time at my aunt and uncle's house," she said simply.

"How long?"

"Two months."

"Claire!" Brenden cried, "Two months? That's most of the summer. How could you be going somewhere for the whole summer and forget to mention it to anyone? It's so stupid."

Claire looked extremely hurt and glared at him. "I am not stupid!" she protested angrily and Brenden sighed.

"Nah, Claire... That isn't what I meant. I know you aren't stupid..." He frowned. "I can't hear myself think. C'mon..."

By the time she'd followed him and managed to make it over Jamie, Angela, Maria, Brady and Ryan, Claire was beginning to think that sitting in the middle of the booth wasn't as great of an idea as she had originally thought it was.

"Where're you guys going?" Maria asked, stopping them and getting the attention to at least Ryan and Brady.

"Outside," Brenden answered roughly, grabbing Claire's hand and attempting to pull her away but Maria stopped them again, asking, "Why're you going out there?" She grinned and Ryan let out a catcall. Claire flushed and followed Brenden obediently, refusing to look back.

"Why are you mad at me?" she asked once they'd left, taking the side door which led into a parking lot.

Brenden sighed heavily, shoving a hand through his hair, something Claire had begun to notice was one of his nervous habits. It had gotten quite a bit longer than it was the summer before, but Claire didn't doubt that he would cut off his shaggy, light brown bangs again, not too far into the summer. Perhaps even in Ecuador. He glanced up at her and, for once, Claire saw worry and apprehension in his dark eyes.

"Look, Claire," he tried to explain, looking extremely frustrated, "It's like this: remember what happened last summer?"

Claire would have raised an eyebrow if she knew how, but she settled with simply looking surprised. "Of course, I remember. How could I forget?"

How could _anyone_ who knew what had really happened _ever_ forget? The summer before had been too strange for words to describe. Jackie and Claire had been kidnapped, Jackie was rescued, Claire was basically brainwashed, they both found out they were mutants, Brenden and Angela found out they were mutants... The list went on and on, all culminating in a face off which Jackie and Claire had participated in, in order to save their own town from having to go through what they went through. And other then Jackie, Brenden, Angela, and herself, no one else knew any better than to think that the girls had been abducted and were saved unharmed by 'a special squad'.

Claire actually had thought it was kind of cool when she looked back on it, especially because they all still had their mutant abilities. Of course, Brenden thought the entire experience had been horrifying, especially since he hadn't known where either of the girls were, or even if they were alive.

"July 10th," he said firmly, catching her gaze and frowning like she was a little child. "It was one month from tomorrow, last year that you two disappeared and I didn't know if I would ever see you again. And then when I did see you finally, you were trying to kill me and Jackie and Angela. Maybe you don't remember it that way, but you had some idea of what was going on. You knew more about those guys than they knew about themselves. I didn't know shit."

"Brenden, I-" Claire stammered. Even after seeing how much more protective he'd become in the past year, she still hadn't understood that he was so much more affected than any of them.

"Claire," he began and she bit her lip, ready for whatever he was going to say next, "I... I just want to know that I can keep you safe." The next thing she knew, Brenden's arms were around her shoulders embracing her, and as soon as her mind began working again, she hugged him back even tighter. "I don't know how I'm going to do that if you're way over in Dakota," he mumbled into her curly, reddish hair.

"Don't worry," she muttered back, "I can astroproject, remember? I'll come back now and then to say 'hi', and you'll know I'm okay. I'll have Jackie with me." She paused, pulling back to smile at him. "And I need to learn how to take care of myself. We're mutants. Who knows if something like that will ever happen again?"

"I hope not," Jackie's voice said and the two turned to see the other girl, staring boredly at them from the side door of Big 10, "'Cause if you two start acting this this every time that sort of thing happens, we are going to have some _serious_ problems."

Brenden smirked at her. "It was Ryan, wasn't it?" he asked.

Jackie just rolled her eyes, replying, "Now, however did you guess that?" She reached up to touch the side of her head that had been soaked by what was probably one of Brady's Suicide Pops.

"Let's get out of here before they set the place on fire," Brenden suggested, not bothering to hide his extreme amusement in Jackie's predicament.

Jackie frowned, stalking down the street towards where Brenden had parked his truck, the anger far too strong to be simply from the snickering Brenden had taken too. He stopped laughing and narrowed his eyes to glare at her retreating figure before turning to glance at the concerned expression of Claire's face.

"What was that all about? Can't she deal with a joke?" he asked stubbornly anyway.

"Last summer, Brenden..."

Hugging her arms around herself, Claire jogged off down the street after Jackie. When he realized what had happened, he wanted to kick his own ass as he set off down the street at a lengthy stride to find the girls. His comment had undoubtedly reminded Jackie of one incident in particular from the summer before. A pyrokinetic mutant that went by the name of Pyro - one who had become the first guy she had actually liked since her brother's death earlier that year - had set her house on fire, laughing the whole time as Jackie's family was trapped inside. Her family had escaped with only minor burns, except for her grandfather who almost died in the hospital from lack of oxygen. That act by Pyro had set Jackie on a rampage, releasing all the rage she felt over her brother's recent death, and the girl was on the verge on killing Pyro when they stopped her finally. Since then, the slightest mention of fire made Jackie flinch.

He was still caught up deep in thought when he reached the doors and didn't even bother to pull the key to the truck's door out of his pocket. Instead, he set his hand up against the cool metal, glad for a chance to finally use his abilities without having to worry about exposure. Brenden's hand began to glow and there was a click as the door unlocked and he climbed in, starting the ignition by twisting the key that was already in it.

No one said anything on the ride while he dropped off the girls.

-----

Virgil and Richie stepped out of the theatre, both boys considerably happier, cooler, and more scared of trees that they had ever thought they would be in their lives. Of course, people had said that was what happened when you saw _Bloodsucker Teenage Zombie XIII: Murderers Hide in Trees_. And, as all _Bloodsucker _fans knew, those movies were never disappointing. Each movie always seemed to have more blood than the last, though it was always tasteful and believable killing - even when it was done by little elfish creatures with green skin who named themselves after days of the weeks and were known as the ferocious 'Tree People'. It was these Tree People that had Virgil and Richie making sure to avoid trees as they headed out to their car, arguing about important issues.

"Virg, just admit it. _Halloween on Devil's Drive_ is the only _Bloodsucker_ movie that was creepier than this one."

"C'mon, man! _Halloween on Devil's Drive_ was the second one made, sure, but they had possessed little kids dressed up in Halloween costumes killing people! That isn't scary! _Spring Break by Brutal Bay_ was creepy," Virgil argued back heatedly.

Though it took the entire two minutes that the walk to the car consisted of, the boys finally agreed that _Camp Cadaver Creak_ was the scariest of the _Bloodsucker _movies with _Driver's Ed is for the Dead_ coming in as a close second thanks to the fact that the evil brain-eating worm creature that was pretending to be the teacher looked a lot like the woman that had taught them.

"_Arson on Christmas_," Virgil said suddenly as they were climbing in the car and Richie raised an eyebrow.

"We didn't ever even see that one, man," Richie pointed out, pulling the passenger door shut and clicking the seatbelt into place, "Remember?"

"It was because of Hotstreak. The movie was supposed to start playing Christmas morning last year, but at midnight, Hotstreak set the movie theater on fire," Virgil explained and started the car. Richie nodded, staring out the side window of the car as he often did.

"Other people saw the movie. We were in the real thing."

-----

Jackie frowned as Claire tugged her cell phone out of her pocket and checked the time again. For the past hour and a half or so, the girls had been sitting in chairs near the luggage terminals at Dakota's airport while they waited for Claire's aunt and uncle to show up. A copy of _Antony and Cleopatra_ sat in Claire's lap, held open by one of her hands as the other checked to see if she had missed any phone calls. Jackie had entertained herself by playing _Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories _on her Gameboy SP, but even that could only consumed her attention span for a few hours and she'd been playing it on the plane ride also. Though she wasn't actually so bored that she would snatch up her copy of _Alice in Wonderland _- she'd read it several times before - Jackie felt herself on the edge of doing something that desperate.

"Are you going to bother calling them again?" Jackie groaned as she heard the distinct beeping noise that told her the buttons on Claire's cell phone were being pressed. She didn't even need to turn her head from the Gameboy to know that her best friend was sticking her tongue out in response.

Despite her own grumbling, Jackie was secretly praying that Claire's aunt and uncle would pick up their stupid cell phones, even if it was just to tell the two girls that they weren't actually going to show up and the girls should walk. At least then they would know what was going on. Jackie saved her game and clicked the Gameboy off, glancing over at Claire. She had, once again, been unable to reach her family and was now staring at the screen of her cell phone as if that would make it more likely for her aunt and uncle to call.

"I just don't understand it," Claire complained, her gaze locking with Jackie's own, "Why in the world would they just not show up? Or even call? I never knew them to be anything but prompt and-"

"Claire." Jackie frowned at her friend as she cut her off. Claire had been speeding up to the point that Jackie could hardly understand between the indistinct syllables and muttering, though the copper-haired girl had apparently not noticed it at all.

"Yes, Jackie?"

Jackie nodded towards something behind Claire and asked, "Those your missing persons?"

Claire twisted in her seat instantly and hopped up, smiling brightly as if she had only been waiting for five minutes instead of almost two hours. Heading towards them were two people; the woman was black-haired and obviously of Asian descent, but the family resemblance between Claire and the man was unmistakable. Claire's aunt waved cheerfully and Jackie began to wonder whether everyone in Claire's family was always so chipper. If so, Jackie was going to get quite a few headaches in the next couple months. Claire and her aunt embraced each other tightly but her uncle was a little more reserved, simply patting her on the shoulder fondly.

"Claire-bear!" Claire flushed instantly at the nickname given by her aunt. "I'm so happy that you came to come the summer! You'll just adore Dakota, I promise!"

"I'm sure it'll be awesome, Auntie Karen," Claire replied and turned, grasping Jackie's wrist tightly and pulling her forward, "This is Jaclyn Edith Kelly-Goss."

Claire's uncle raised an eyebrow before saying, "Got a shorter version for that, Kelly-Goss?"

Jackie just rose an eyebrow in response and sharply answered, "Jackie."

For a few moments, Claire's uncle gazed at Jackie as if he was sizing her up in a test she hadn't been informed of. Jackie just stared back, sticking her hands in the pockets of her camo cargos. When he finally nodded to himself, Claire's uncle extended his hand. "Mark Roberts."

Claire looked ecstatic that Jackie had been approved by her family members until a confused look crossed her face and she bit her lip before asking, "Hey, how come you guys were so late? And you didn't call us either. I was worried." Jackie crossed her arms across her chest as Auntie Karen glanced at Uncle Mark, a silent conversation seeming to pass between their glances.

"It was an unexpected... _situation_ that held us up. Several telephone poles had been knocked down along with a-" Karen paused. "There was just a bit of damage done by some unruly kids."

Claire nodded understandingly, but Jackie wasn't appeased by this answer. She had seen these same expressions before when her own parents had something that they couldn't tell her little brothers. It was the look of a blatant liar, who wasn't very good at it either. Jackie turned her head, glaring at her bags instead of either of Claire's aunt or uncle as she picked up her duffel bag and swung it over her shoulder. Jackie picked up two more of her suitcases and the three others with her began picking up luggage also. As the heavily loaded quartet set off towards the parking lot, Jackie frowned at Uncle Mark's back.

Jackie wanted to know what was going on.

And she would find out.

-----

_.......REVIEW_

a/n; I'm feeling really weird as I type these words. It's 12:00 AM and the only reason I'm still on such a typing high was from all the de-carbonated root beer I've been drinking all night. So, if anything I type from this point forward sounds really confusing or something, take pity on me. I've been working on an essay on _Antony and Cleopatra_ for my Honors English 9 class and I'm on a total brain drain at the moment. No sleep, caffeine, plot bunnies, and the evils of Shakespeare do that to you when mixed together. But that isn't my point. My real author's notes are on the story and also pleading that everyone keep faith in me on this story. Please continue reading.

REVIEW, REVIEW, REVIEW - (i have an early final next thursday... make me happy...) REVIEW, REVIEW, REVIEW

This story is, as the summary said, a sequel. Strangely, it's actually a sequel to a story I wrote in the X-Men: Evolution category, but it should be pretty easy to understand even if you don't watch Evo. I'll try to make things as clear as possible, but the main link between these two stories is Jackie and Claire. There are, of course, some Evo characters mentioned at different points, but it won't be of too much importance.

REVIEW, REVIEW, REVIEW - (i have an early final next thursday... make me happy...) REVIEW, REVIEW, REVIEW

For everyone who didn't read "**Rest in Pieces**", the prequel to this story, Jackie Kelly-Goss and Claire Roberts are a form of self-insert type characters because their personalities - and even names - are mixes of people I know. Same with Brenden Kelly, Ben, Vince, the faceless Andrew Robb... But they're more of original characters now, because I realize that my friends have all changed a ton since we entered high school and nothing even really had a big "just-like-this-person" thing in the first place. Go ahead and insult them as much as you like, it doesn't feel like you're insulting me or my friends. And for all people who are considering wasting your time to bother saying, "NO ONE LIKES SELF-INSERTS! BLAH!", I will have to point and laugh. I obviously like to read self-inserts and so do other people that I know. Get a clue and don't waste your energy to be mean.

REVIEW, REVIEW, REVIEW - (i have an early final next thursday... make me happy...) REVIEW, REVIEW, REVIEW

Next, I beg everyone to have faith in me. I will finish this story. I know I haven't written more than the first couple chapters for many of my fics that are posted, but the real truth is: I _have_ written it. I wrote it all months ago. I'm just too lazy to bother posting it. My new mantra is "I will post at least once a week any new material I have", so I swear I will get this fic done, just like I'm going to get my other fics done. My life just got a lot more stable, so I'm ready to do what I love. I'm going to type up my stories.

REVIEW, REVIEW, REVIEW - (i have an early final next thursday... make me happy...) REVIEW, REVIEW, REVIEW

Thanks to all readers, reviewers, and supporters and here's to hoping for more next week.

_.......REVIEW_

- Roby Carr


	2. 2: Disturbing the Peace, Much?

"**Summer Days, Summer Nights**"  
By _Roby Carr  
_Part Two: _Disturbing the Peace, Much?_

-----

"Talk about weird..." Claire groaned, stretching as she pulled herself from her stomach to her knees, "They really should have called Cleopatra the drama queen of the Nile." She glanced down, carefully marking her page in her copy of Antony and Cleopatra and finally turned to faced the simple oak desk in the room, at which sat Jackie. Claire pursed her lips and leaned back against the wall, focusing on her friend across the room. Jackie was slumped over on the desk, her head in her arms and she stared at no spot in particular on the closest wall.

"Isn't that nice..." Jackie murmured back, her lips barely moving and the rest of her body staying stationary.

Claire frowned. Why wasn't her best friend answering her properly, cynically, sarcastically, anything! It was almost scary. Nothing especially obvious had happened to Jackie lately, so she had no reason to be acting this way. Maybe it was the sudden change of location, but Claire was a little irritated, something even she knew was strange.

"Are you alright?" she asked slowly, standing and approaching her friend to place a hand on her shoulder. The moment her palm touched Jackie's black t-shirt, she jerked forward and stumbled, barely holding herself up as she grasped onto Jackie.

"Claire!" Jackie cried and spun, grasping her friends hand and glancing up at her to see that her eyes were unfocused and staring at something Jackie couldn't see. Her breathing was shallow, accompanied by a cough every moment or so and her eyes began to water as Jackie suddenly realized what was happening. Claire's powers as a mutant were widespread, but included her visions of the future. This, like many times before, was one of those moments that were originally shocking.

Relaxing slightly, Jackie kept an eye on her friend as she continued to support her by her arms, wondering what it was that Claire was experiencing to cause a reaction like this. The dirty-blonde haired girl sighed in annoyance and sat back in her chair, deciding that, frustrating as it was, the only way to find out was to wait.

-----

Claire' winced as a familiar bright white light flooded her eyes and began forming a scene around her. The first thing she noticed was the gaseous substance, visible in the air as green smoke. She coughed harshly as she inhaled some of it and she could feel her entire body stiffen. She couldn't run to escape the gas and it just kept coming as she choked on it, feeling strangely satisfied with the relaxed feeling it caused.

"Psych!" a voice shouted and the redhead turned her head, finding that she had control of her body back once again. Jackie stood at the end of a gas-filled corridor, waving to her impatiently. "They aren't here! Static and Gear have already checked the rest of the place out. C'mon, or I'm leaving without you."

Claire wanted to shout back, to ask about the gas and find out who Static and Gear were, but her voice wouldn't work and the bright white light filled her eyes once again as she was jolted back to reality.

-----

Claire stumbled forward into a large piece of furniture. As her eyes adjusted, she felt Jackie push her back a bit, allowing her to grasp her bearing on her own, though she still ended up falling back on her behind. She could still smell the sulfur-like stench of that gas and she felt like she could hardly breathe. Jackie raised an eyebrow and leaned down, offering her a hand.

"Get some water and come back here so I can hear about your vision," Jackie instructed her, but though she accepted the help in standing, she shook her head. It was beginning to clear up, her lungs filling with the room's fresh air and her mind setting the pieces of the vision back in place so that she could recall it.

"I'm alright, but something it going to happen. I don't know what, but there was this gas and a corridor and you were there and you talked about Static and Gear and I don't know. It was confusing and I forgot how these things work and-"

"Whoa, Psych-o-path. Slow down and just tell me everything you remember, exactly as it happened."

Claire nodded to her best friend and turned, so focused on the vision that she forgot to reprimand her about the teasing. She sat down on the bed and tucked her legs under her, closing her eyes as she explained the vision to her best friend. Everything she could remember she added in until finally Jackie stopped her, frowning.

"Repeat that last part," she demanded.

"You looked really determined and-"

"No, the part about the clothes. Tell me what I was wearing again."

Claire hadn't expected that at all. Jackie had never been one to care much about her appearance, but she seemed fixated upon exactly what she looked like in this vision, so Claire replied, "You were wearing baggy black girls' cargos. Your shoes were black combat boots, laced up really tightly. And your shirt was just a black hooded sweatshirt, I think. But you were wearing this dark red vest that looked sort of strange for some reason on top of that and fingerless gloves in the same color. That's all I can remember."

"Damnit!" Jackie said suddenly, slamming her fist against the top of the desk, "I thought so. Bet it looked familiar, right?"

"Yeah. It did, sort of. How did you know?"

Jackie looked furious, "Because that's the uniform I wore last summer with the X-Men. The gloves and the vest were fire-proof so I could take of Pyro. I thought it was going to be this sort of shit when you mentioned I called you Psych. We haven't actually used those codenames since the battles last summer."

"You think that we're going to have to fight the Acolytes again?" Claire asked, horrified. She had far too many bad memories of the Acolytes to ever want to even consider seeing them again.

Jackie shook her head and replied, "I'm betting it'll be something else. But what I'm wondering is who Static and Gear are? They must be other mutants here in Dakota."

"It didn't feel like that," Claire said tiredly and Jackie sighed.

"I'm going to sleep. You do it too and we'll talk tomorrow, deal?"

Claire nodded and Jackie left briskly, shutting the door behind her rather harshly.

In the hallway alone, Jackie leaned against the door and took a deep breath. She was not ready to take on another group of bad guys and play hero. And she didn't ever want to touch that fireproof vest again.

Because that meant she would be near fire, and Jaclyn Edith Kelly-Goss despised fire.

-----

It was far too early in Jackie's opinion when she opened her eyes the next morning, cranky at having been woken before noon - it was summer, for God's sake! Groaning, she turned onto her side and pulled her pillow over her head, trying to block out the noise that had woken her. But, of course, it was impossible to drown out. Peeking out, she realized that the noise was her own Mexican Hat Dance ring tone on her cell phone. Jack sat up, raising an eyebrow. No one was supposed to call her long distance unless it was an emergency. Reaching out, she picked it up and pressed the talk button, holding it up.

"Who the hell decided to call me?" she growled, not registering the consequences if it was her parents. Luckily though, it wasn't.

"Jackie! Thank the lord that I was able to get a hold of you. I would have called the house but I don't know the number and Claire's number isn't programmed into my cell phone and-"

"Angela?" Jackie frowned, "This is long distance! What the hell made you call? The X-men need help or something again?" She knew her sarcasm wasn't very good and it could have been entirely sincere. Angela didn't even seem to notice Jackie's tone though.

"It's horrid, Jackie-"

"What is it?" Jackie interrupted, irritated and wanting to go back to sleep for another precious hour.

"Brenden," Angela said softly and she continued after a long pause, "Jackie, you're going to have to be the one to tell Claire. There was an accident - a car crash. Brenden and the rest of their family were heading to the airport for their trip to Ecuador. But a van was out of control and moving way too fast and, Jackie, it hit the back-left side of the car. Brenden was sitting there. His family is alright. The worst was his mom's broken arm. But it was awful and Brenden's in the hospital." She sighed.

"I can't believe it. Claire is going to freak," Jackie said, standing and moving to the window. It was hard to believe that a world could look so nice and then go around breaking people's arms and sending them to the hospital.

"It's room 151 at St. Margaret's," Angela told the girl on the other end of the line and Jackie nodded before she realized that Angela couldn't see her.

"Thanks for telling me, Angela," she said, glaring at the car that drove past, "I'll make sure Claire finds out about it."

The line went dead and Jackie shut her phone off, staring at it in her hand. How was she supposed to be the one to tell Claire the some idiot driver broke her boyfriend? This wasn't the type of thing Jackie was good at. Claire was empathetic, Angela was comforting, and Jackie was completely clueless as to helping people feel better. Oh well, might as well get it over and done with. Maybe Claire wouldn't mind that Brenden was in the hospital suffering through pain and broken bones and whatever had happened.

Yeah right.

Jackie stalled, changing into a pair of black boys cargos and an overly-large black t-shirt. She re-laced her sneakers before sliding them on and actually took the time to brush out her short hair. She spent over five minutes on her pigtails and finally realized that she was out of stuff to do. She opened the door of her bedroom, staring at the room down the hallway. This was really, really going to suck. Reaching it, she knocked before pushing the already half-open door farther open.

Claire was on her bed, still reading Antony and Cleopatra, when she looked up and grinned widely, making Jackie feel like the worst person in the world. Her best friend was sitting there, chilling out and having a great summer and she was supposed to ruin it all by telling her that her boyfriend was in a _hospital_.

"Listen, Claire," Jackie started and her friend gestured for her to come sit down. Jackie moved towards the bed and sat down rigidly.

"You're finally up, Sleeping Beauty," Claire teased gently and closed her book, marking her page as she did so, "What's up?"

"Well, I just got a call on my cell phone from Angela..." Jackie couldn't figure out what to say. Could she make a joke out of it or something?

"And?" her best friend urged.

"And something really bad happened," Jackie answered as quickly as she could, "to Brenden."

"Oh my God!" Claire gasped, "Tell me he's okay. Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God! Was he in a plane crash? Tell me he didn't die."

"No, Claire, calm down," Jackie told her friend, grabbing her by the shoulders, prepared to use force if necessary, "He wasn't on the plane. He wasn't even out of the state. It was a car crash and I guess he got hurt pretty bad, but Angela didn't seem drastically worried, so I'm sure that he'll be fine."

"Where is he?"

"It's a hospital," Jackie explained, having expected this. Of course, Claire was going to do the whole astroprojection thing so that she could go check on Brenden. And thus, she needed his location. "It's St. Margaret's, right in Glen Ellyn. Room 151 if they didn't move him or anything. Check before going. Third-eye or whatever you call it. And look the bedroom door. I'm going out." Jackie was not going to take the chance of having to be the bearer of any more bad news. She just wasn't good at this and, for her own protection, she was going to get as far away from that cell phone as she could.

"You take your cell phone with you. I'll call if I find anything out or if we need you home."

Of maybe she was going to stay right by it all afternoon.

Things sucked sometimes.

-----

Jackie strode down the sidewalk next to some street near the middle of Dakota. She'd rather have done something that was actually fun instead of walking around like a complete fool, but Claire was currently locked in her bedroom doing her astroprojection-thing since her third eye had finally watched Brenden's mother leave the room Brenden was staying in at the Glen Ellyn hospital. Jackie didn't doubt that while her friend's body was technically dead on the bed in her bedroom, her visual spirit had been warped back to Glen Ellyn to see Brenden. And this left Jackie to spend the afternoon however she wanted to.

But Jackie quickly began to realize that there wasn't actually all that much for her to really do around the Roberts' house. Instead, she had taken the subway out to whichever stop had the coolest name and was now walking around on the sidewalks, entirely lost without caring, and absorbed in a piece of paper in her hand. It had been torn out of the Roberts' newspaper, something Claire had pointed out that morning while eating a bagel and glancing through the articles over her uncle's shoulder. Jackie watched as her uncle just told her to forget about it and Claire had pouted, but Jackie's interest was piqued. Curiosity wasn't usually her thing, but Jackie had trusted instinct before and it had saved lives. She wasn't going to doubt it now.

She had torn it out just as she was passing through the kitchen on her way out of the house, it being the first time neither of the adults had been in there, and it hadn't been until now that she had gotten the chance to look at it. It wasn't even all that interesting, even though it had been right there on the front page as one of the main stories with a picture that was even in color. Just something about a guy who'd gotten out of jail lately.

_'Francis "F-Stop" Stone, also known as the bang-baby, Hotstreak, was once again released from Dakota City Penitentiary earlier than was expected. His three-month sentence for petty arson and disturbing the peace was cut short to only one month and four days due to good behavior and positive reports from a city-appointed anger management councilor.'_

Jackie almost laughed as she read it over again and glanced at the picture. This 'Francis' guy was pretty buff, even Jackie had to admit, though not to such an extreme that it was creepy. He looked rather Irish too, his hair a very unnatural shade of bright red with blonde streaks that assured her it had to be dyed. And even she could see what a crappy dye job it was.

Just as she was wondering what company it was that provided such bright hair colors though, she slammed into a much larger figure than her own, being knocked back onto her butt and dropping the folded paper she held. She winced inwardly, but outwardly she only said, "Hey! Watch where you're going, jerk!"

"What're you going to do about it if I don't?" a voice snarled back. Her eyes traveled forward to fall upon a pair of black and white skater shoes that were much too clean for Jackie's taste. They continued up Skater Boy's legs, clad in khaki-colored cargo pants that were so baggy and showed so much of his boxers that it was hard to tell how they stayed on. Next was a tight red shirt over a muscled chest and finally a face that was extremely familiar to Jackie. She'd only been looking at it a moment before. It was the boy from the article... what was his name again? Francis?

"Forget you. You aren't even worth the effort," she replied, evading his question quite nicely.

"No," Francis told her, with a dark smirk that Jackie really didn't like, "You're right."

"What?"

"I've got to start watching where I'm going," Francis explained, looking sincere in a very, very venomous way - if that was possible.

"Whatever, just go bother someone else," she snapped back angrily. It was only now that she had noticed that the entire sidewalk on her side of the street was emptied and there were very few people on the other side, most of them in the process of getting out of there anyway. Jackie didn't really want to find out why they were all over there. This dude 'disturbed the peace'. Big whoop. It wasn't like he was a serial killer or anything.

"The least I can do for you is help you up, right?" he said simply, "Oh, look. You dropped something."

Francis reached down and picked up the folded newspaper article. He grinned in a twisted manner and his eyes never left her face as he gauged her reaction as to what he would do next. In a moment, the paper in his hand flared up and burned away, stunning her into silence. She knew she looked terrified, a look the Jackie Kelly-Goss very seldom wore. She was even angry at herself for betraying her emotion before this boy. Jackie wasn't even actually afraid of him. All she could think of was that fire the summer before, the fire that Claire's third eye had shown her and she couldn't do a thing as it burned, her family still inside that home, because she wasn't there to protect them.

She hated fire.

As Francis towered over her, his furious expression darkening by the moment as he stared down at her triumphantly, glad to see the horror on his victim's face. He was about to continue when a bolt of blue lightning whizzed past him, crackling against the wall behind him. Jackie twisted around from her spot on the ground, startled and half-expecting to see that one guy, Berzerker, from the Xavier Institute. That had sure looked like one of his attacks. Instead she saw two guys, dressed in extremely weird costumes, both of which looked like they were about to play 'knight-in-shining-armor' for her. Yeah, like Jackie was going to let that happen anytime soon.

"You haven't been out of jail for more than a week and you're already harassing people, Hotstreak?" one of the two boys said, making Jackie rather annoyed. Banter was cool and all, but making comments about jail sentence and stuff like that, that was low - not hero. "What happened to good behavior and anger management?"

"You can't do anything to me, Sparky," Francis - or was he Hotstreak? - replied, glaring at both of them, hovering in thin air like they were all that.

The second hero dropped to the ground and stepped towards her, like he was going to kneel down and ask if she was alright, but Hotstreak grabbed her arm to yank her up and Jackie's eyes widened in pain when his red-hot hand burned against her skin.

Jackie's eyes narrowed and she slammed her head forward on her shoulders, wincing when she bit her tongue and her chin hit her chest. It'd been a while since she'd last tried this. Though her head didn't even touch Hotstreak as did no other part of her body, he let out a loud groan and stumbled back, gripping his stomach and trying to catch his breath.

"Woah..." the boy in the helmet said and she noted that he still didn't look all that surprised behind his visor. He turned to look at her and Jackie glared back defiantly, not exactly sure what she was even being defiant of.

A ball of fire shot past their heads and both turned to look at Hotstreak, who had pulled himself up using the wall as help. Glaring darkly at the two strangely-dressed boys and Jackie, he spat, "You can't say I did anything wrong, Static. I ain't breakin' any laws yet." The 'yet' sounded suspiciously foreboding, but Hotstreak left too quickly for Jackie to even decide that she didn't actually care about anything this guy said. The boy above her in the air, the one she was pretty sure had shot the electricity from his hands, looked like he was going to follow after him, but apparently Francis had been right when he said he hadn't done anything illegal, because instead the boy landed on the ground next to his partner and glanced at Jackie.

"Are you okay?" he asked and Jackie's eyes traveled down to his feet, more interested in the piece of metal he'd been hovering on than the actual boy. It just looked like a normal round piece of thin metal. So, how did it float? She looked back up at the boy and frowned skeptically. His costume looked ridiculous. Was he supposed to be Superboy or something? Internally, she forcedly berated herself. She'd acted that same way about Magneto and the Acolytes at their base last summer and look at how that had turned out. No, she was certainly going to be more careful this time around.

Or at least she would pretend to be.

"He asked if you were okay?" the boy wearing the helmet repeated for her and Jackie scowled darkly at him. What did he think she was? A child? An invalid? Of course she could take care of herself against some wanna-be, punk asshole.

Ignoring the fact that he could call up fire anyway.

"I'm fine. What did you expect? He couldn't have done a thing if he tried!" Jackie replied, annoyed by this treatment. It wasn't until now that she even noticed the strange look she was receiving from the electricity kid. "What is it? Usually I wouldn't care about it, but it's really starting to piss me off that you just won't stop staring!"

"What'd you do?" he asked simply and Jackie paused. It hadn't occurred to her either that she'd used her mutant powers to thrust a telekinetic wave into Hotstreak's stomach and knock him back. She'd been so terrified by the flames that she hadn't thought of the repeated warnings that she was _never_ supposed to use her powers in public.

"Well-" She paused and narrowed her eyes once again, placing one hand on her hip. "What'd you do? Normal people don't throw around lightning like a toy. And him! That Hotstreak asshole! What'd he do?"

"Come on," the boy in the helmet said, answering for his partner - well, they seemed to be partners anyway- as he crossed his arms over his chest, "He's a bang baby. A metahuman. Everyone's heard of Hotstreak. And he," he gestured to the electric kid, "is Static. And I'm Gear. You know, Dakota's superheroes? We take down Hotstreak, Ebon, Talon, Kangorr, Carmendillo on a regular basis? That sort of thing?" Jackie hardly blinked, appearing unphased by this. "You can't be telling me you've never heard of us. Of them. Shiv? Puff?"

"I'm not from around here."

Despite seeming entirely bored, Jackie could not have been any more confused as he said this. Weren't they mutants? Obviously not, according to what this guy - Gear - said. He called them bang babies, metahumans. And how many had he mentioned? At least eight. Maybe ten? A summer ago, Professor Xavier had said that the number of mutants, latent mutants, and potential mutants in Glen Ellyn was strangely high. But according to what Gear was saying, there had to be tons of 'bang babies' in Dakota.

An extremely quiet voice pounded in the back of Jackie's head and despite how much of an oxymoron that last statement was, even attempting to dwell on that fact couldn't keep her from feeling as though there was something about these boys she was supposed to be remembering at the time. Something extremely important that she would probably screaming at herself for not realizing earlier once she did realize it.

"Yeah, that's obvious."

"You still didn't tell us what you did."

The boys voices resounded clearly for Jackie to hear and reply to, but she ignored them, frowning. Static and Gear... Gear and Static... Static and Gear... Gear and Static... She meant to cross her arms across her chest as she thought but a sudden feeling of hot pain raced through her arm and she realized that a red handprint-shaped burn had appeared where Hotstreak had 'helped her up', so to speak. Glancing at it, a line of thought struck her instantly. Following it in her mind, Jackie could feel her expression changing to one of shock.

The burn on her arm.

The burns on her ankles.

The burns from Pyro.

The X-Men fighting Pyro.

The uniform she got from the X-Men.

The uniform she wore in Claire's vision.

The words she spoke in Claire's vision.

_'Static and Gear have already checked the rest of the place out.'_

Static and Gear.

-----

"Claire?"

Claire glanced up suddenly from the seat she'd taken next to Brenden's bed, silently watching her boyfriend rest. She'd been sure to come when no one was in the room, but she had forgotten completely about being wary otherwise. And now someone had seen her and if they knew she was supposed to be in Dakota, or if they mentioned it to someone who knew that, she would be exposed soon as a mutant and then they would find out about Jackie and Brenden and Angela-

"Astroprojection, right?"

Well, speak of the angel.

Angela closed the door and locked it behind her, checking that the blinds over the windows showing into Brenden's room were closed tightly before she turned to face her curly-haired friend. Claire couldn't have looked any more relieved that it was Angela who'd shown up, instead of one of the many people that didn't share her secret and Angela could easily guess why. They'd been given the 'exposure-is-bad' speech too many times before to think that having someone realize they were mutants didn't matter.

"Yeah," Claire told her softly, letting out a relieved sigh, "It's my astroprojection."

"Be more careful," Angela warned her solemnly, "Jackie told you then?"

"Yeah. She told me about... about the accident and I needed to visit. I wanted to come see him. I couldn't ever forgive myself if I wasn't here for Brenden."

Angela took the seat next to her friend, staring down at the brunette laying in the bed before them. She could understand what Claire meant. Not empathetically or anything - Claire's power, not hers -, but just basic human instinct gave her the sympathy to care about both Brenden and Claire.

"He cut his hair..." Claire reached out and brushed her fingertips against the top of his head. Still light brown and hopelessly messy, it was as short as she remembered it being the summer before and spikier than ever before, "I knew he would."

"Claire..." Watching the red-headed girl sit there, Angela, for the first time in her life, had no idea what to do. Claire looked broken-hearted over the sight of her boyfriend, the needles connected to IVs sticking out from his arms and the back of one of his hands.

"He isn't going to wake up again. I know it. I left and I wasn't here and I couldn't be there for him and keep him safe and I-"

"Claire! He will wake up! God won't let him die after everything Brenden has done. He's too much of a good person to die so early. Last year he said the same things when we couldn't find you and Jackie. He said, 'We'll never get her back will we? We won't ever find them and if we do, they'll be dead!' He thought he was an idiot and it was his fault that it all happened. And he was wrong about it, because Jackie came back and so did you and you remembered him. You didn't remember Jackie or Nate or me, but as soon as Brenden reminded you who he was, you remembered everything. He'll wake up because he wants to see you again. You and everyone else." Angela caught her breath, silently praying to the Lord that Claire would believe her. That Claire would understand and would be strong again.

Slowly, a smile broke out on Claire's face and she hugged Angela suddenly, surprising the Catholic girl immensely. She hadn't realized her little speech would affect Claire so much.

"Yeah. Brenden will come back, won't he?" she repeated and pushed back some of the long reddish curls that were hanging over her shoulders, "I should go back to my body before my aunt and uncle begin to wonder and find me dead. I don't want to make them worry." She stood and paused to look down. "Angela... Thank you so much."

Angela stared at Claire for a moment before nodding. This having been said, Claire dematerialized in front of Angela and the Filipina girl stood up again, brushing her hand against Brenden's arm as she did so. She desperately wanted to used her own mutant powers - healing - to help Brenden, but his miraculous recovery would be too risky. They would want to run more tests to find out what had made his body heal so quickly and they might discover his powers. Once again, exposure was going to keep her from helping someone and she despised it.

Sighing, Angela fixed the blinds and unlocked the door as she left the room in silence.

-----

"_Static and Gear?_" the girl repeated to Gear and the boy frowned. She hadn't answered any of their questions, but here she was asking things that they had already answered. Quite thoroughly too if his memory served him correctly - and, as he was a super genius, it always did.

But Static seemed to be feeling a lot more patient than his partner at that point in time despite the summer heat and the electrical hero nodded in response. "Why do you ask?"

"Look, hero," Jackie said, paying no attention to his question as she glared at the burn on her arm, "You and your sidekick-" Gear protested wholeheartedly to this. "-need to meet me and my partner so we can discuss something. And I want you two outta uniform. I only work with people who don't look like total morons." Both boys looked quiet annoyed with this comment in particular.

"Look, you still haven't answered our questions. What'd you do to Hotstreak and why do you need to meet us?" Static asked and Jackie sighed.

"Here's the deal, Static. My name is Jackie Kelly-Goss, codename Scythe. I'm what they call a mutant. I was born with something called an X-gene which gave me special abilities. A lot of people have X-genes and powers like telepathy and junk. My powers are based off of telekinetic attacks. Last summer, I helped save the world from a genocidal mutant called Magneto. My friend helped too. Her powers include the ability to see the future and she had a vision with you two in it," the girl explained, "You guys might be a little bit experienced, but I've saved the non-mutant part of the human race from mass extinction, so just believe me, okay?"

Static glanced over at Gear and the other boy nodded, not quite as stupefied by the rapid-fire explanation as his partner. Despite the fact that it wasn't in their nature to trust so simply - especially when they had only met this girl moments earlier - , both Static and Gear knew that turning down possible allies was one of the stupidest things they could do.

"Agreed," Static finally answered, "Under one condition - we call the shots. If we feel it's safer to stay in uniform-" Jackie snickered irritatingly at the choice of words. "-then we do that. Fair enough for you to handle?"

Jackie rolled her eyes and just shrugged, "Whatever. You'll believe me eventually."

"You're new, right?" Gear asked, "Do you know where Merde Park is?" From the confused look on her face, he assumed she did not and didn't leave her any more time to make a snide comment. "Take the subway down route B to stop 13. Just above it is the police station. Go east down the street and you'll see the park. It's usually pretty safe because the station is so close. Drug dealers don't bother selling there. Eight o' clock sound alright?"

"Uh... Sure."

After Gear repeated his directions again, the boys departed, Static's gaze fixed behind him at Jackie as she watched them go. It was a little eerie, the idea of genocidal mutants, but he had a feeling that Jackie - despite her rough exterior and unladylike attitude - wasn't like Hotstreak.

For the safety of both Gear and himself, he could only hope he was right.

-----

_.......REVIEW_

a/n; Thanks for reading.

_.......REVIEW_

- Roby Carr


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